Teachers fear students may reveal sexual abuse at school

TEACHERS are not properly covering the child protection curriculum with students because they feel unprepared to deal with disclosures of abuse, an expert warns.

UniSA emeritus professor Freda Briggs said teachers should use the Education Department's Keeping Safe child protection curriculum but some were not because of apprehension about "what it would unearth" and a lack of training about how to respond.

"They (teachers) feel that they are not sufficiently well trained in matters relating to child sex abuse, and they're worried that some children may disclose abuse to them and they're not competent to handle it," Prof Briggs said.

"They need to know how to talk to children (and) children need to know very clearly what is unacceptable, wrong, reportable behaviour - not hush it up."

Professor Briggs was commenting on concerns about how teachers responded to the alleged sexual assault of a female student by another girl at a Hills school in 2010.

Yesterday, it emerged that parents had written to the principal to say students were "aware an incident of some sort has occurred ... and it is naive to think it will not be discussed".

In one letter, a parent said they understood that "on a directive from you (the principal), students ... were told not to discuss any information or rumours about this incident or they would face discipline".

Prof Briggs said this approach sent children the wrong message and was "unwittingly assisting child sex offenders in giving the impression that this behaviour has to be secret".

The Education Department requires all teachers to undergo training before delivering the Keeping Safe curriculum, which includes strategies to prevent children from disclosing personal information in class.

Teachers union spokeswoman Correna Haythorpe said those who taught the curriculum were "very competent". Teachers also undergo Responding to Abuse and Neglect training every three years.

A department spokeswoman said principals were reminded each year of their responsibility to ensure staff were trained to deliver child protection curriculum.

Opposition education spokesman David Pisoni said teachers were underprepared to deal with sexual abuse in schools.